Afghan children the victims

Date: February 10 2013

Kim Gamel

THE US-led international coalition has rejected an accusation that US military strikes have killed hundreds of children in Afghanistan during the past four years, saying they are ''categorically unfounded''.

The statement by the International Security Assistance Force came a day after the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child said the casualties were ''due notably to reported lack of precautionary measures and indiscriminate use of force''.

The coalition also dismissed that claim, saying it took special care to avoid civilian casualties. It said the number of children who died or were wounded from air operations dropped nearly 40 per cent last year compared with the year before, although it did not give specific figures.

The UN was reviewing a range of US policies affecting children for the first time since 2008.

The release of the report coincides with an intensifying debate in Washington over US policy on drones and airstrikes.

In its report, the UN committee told the United States to ''take concrete and firm precautionary measures and prevent indiscriminate use of force to ensure that no further killings and maiming of civilians, including children, take place''.

Human rights and civil liberties groups applauded the findings.

The UN committee referred to ''hundreds'' of children killed since 2008 and expressed alarm that the figure had ''doubled from 2010 to 2011''. A report to the UN Security Council in April last year by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's special representative for children and armed conflict said the number of child casualties blamed on airstrikes conducted by international and allied Afghan forces doubled compared with the last reporting period, with 110 children killed and 68 injured in 2011.

But the international coalition said the number of civilian casualties declined 49 per cent last year compared with 2011.

It also quoted an August report from the UN mission in Afghanistan, saying most Afghan civilian deaths are caused by the insurgency.

Associated Press

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